Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy Integration: An evolving synergy(Relational Perspectives Book Series)

Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy Integration traces the history of efforts to integrate psychoanalysis with other psychotherapeutic modalities, beginning with the early analysts, including Ferenczi and Rank, and continuing on to the present day. It explores the potential for integration made possible by contemporary developments in theory and technique that are fundamental to a relational psychoanalytic approach. Editors Jill Bresler and Karen Starr bring together an array of valuable theoretical and clinical contributions by relationally oriented psychoanalysts who identify their work as integrative. The book is organized in four segments: theoretical frameworks of psychotherapy integration; integrating multiple models of psychotherapy into a psychoanalytically informed treatment; working with specific populations; the future of integration, exploring the issues involved in educating clinicians in integrative practice. The contributions in this volume demonstrate that integrating techniques from a variety of psychotherapies outside of psychoanalysis can enrich and enhance psychoanalytic practice. It will be an invaluable resource for all practicing psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, and psychoanalysts and psychotherapists in training, particularly those with an interest in relational psychoanalysis and psychotherapy integration.

Table of Contents:
Part I: A Conceptual Framework for Integration. Bresler, Starr, Introduction. Safran, Messer, Psychotherapy Integration: A Postmodern Critique. Gold, Stricker, Assimilative Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: An Active, Integrative Approach. Part II: Integrating Multiple Models of Psychotherapy. Farber Shanok, Driving Me Sane: Integrating CBT and Relational Psychodynamic Psychotherapy. Bresler, Psychotherapy Integration: A Pathway to Individuation. Magid, Sitting Together: A Conceptual and Clinical Integration of Psychoanalysis and Zen. Leddick, Integrating Neurofeedback and Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy: A Non-linear Dynamical Systems Approach to Mind and Brain. Rappoport, Dynamic Linking of Psyche and Soma: Somatic Experiencing and Embodied Mentalization. Part Three: Working with Specific Populations. Rothschild, Working together: Integrating Relational Psychoanalysis and Traditional Substance Abuse Treatment in Harm Reduction Therapy. Petrucelli, The Relational Montage of Eating Disorders. Gerson, The Tango of Integration in Couples Therapy. Lyons, Working with Dangerous Behaviors: Integrating Relational Psychoanalysis with Dialectical Behavior therapy with Self-injuring Patients. Part Four: The Future of Integration. Frank, Psychoanalysis and the Twenty-first Century: A Critique and a Vision. Feindler, Kahoud, Two Sides of a Theoretical Coin: Multiple Perspectives on Training in a Dual Orientation Program. Wachtel, Afterward: Reflections on Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy Integration.

About the Author :
Jill Bresler is faculty, NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, and faculty and advisory board member of the Psychotherapy Integration Program at the National Institute for the Psychotherapies. Dr. Bresler is a clinical psychologist who maintains a private practice in New York City. Karen Starr is author, with Lewis Aron, of A Psychotherapy for the People: Toward a Progressive Psychoanalysis, and author of Repair of the Soul: Metaphors of Transformation in Jewish Mysticism and Psychoanalysis. She is Clinical Supervisor at The Graduate Center, CUNY and Adjunct Faculty at Long Island University. Dr. Starr maintains a private practice in New York City and Great Neck, Long Island.

Review :
"Bresler and Starr have brought together a unique and clinically useful collection of contributions from psychoanalysts who are searching for unifying concepts with which to integrate the multiplicity of existing psychotherapeutic approaches and theories about mechanisms of therapeutic action, each of which has its own valuable emphasis. For far too long, psychoanalysis, like one of the blind men feeling the elephant, has mistaken its part for the whole. If psychoanalysis is to survive, as a treatment method and as an investigative discipline, it must expand its horizons. Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy Integration is a much needed step in the right direction." - Owen Renik, M.D., Former Editor-in-Chief, The Psychoanalytic Quarterly